#people’s lack of historical literacy when it comes to certain topics

[hockey-jews]

For anyone who wants to learn more about Judaism! Also, kind of a post about how to deal with some Things and Stuff. This is a long post so I’ll put it under a read more for those interested:

This is really for an anonymous message I got that described struggles with things that I think many of us struggle with or have in the past: not being “Jewish enough” in the eyes of other Jews due to your heritage being on the “wrong” side (read; on your father’s side), yet still experiencing antisemitism from goyim. Not learning very much, if anything, about Judaism as a child but wanting to learn more as an adult. Not being comfortable with some traditions or laws of Judaism because you are a) a feminist b) LGBT c) an atheist. Living in a place with few to no Jewish spaces. Not feeling welcome in the Jewish community due to any or all of these things. 

Book recs!

If you’re the kind of person who enjoys reading (or can at least tolerate it) I highly recommend these books! They’re all books that I have either read/started reading/or plan on reading. (Please keep in mind that none of these are Jewish texts such as the Torah or the Talmud and that I do understand the importance of such religious texts but am not recommending them because I feel those are obvious sources of information)

A Bride for One Night if you aren’t familiar with the Talmud, it’s a collection of writings and explanations of Jewish laws and traditions and it’s old as balls. The author of this book, Ruth Calderon, takes a bunch of Talmudic stories and makes them into these wonderful beautiful stories that are easier to read than the original ones from the 3rd and 6th centuries. Even if you don’t know anything about the Talmud this book is so fascinating and fun to read. 

The G-d Who Hates Lies is literally perfect for you if you have issues with how women are viewed and treated in the most traditional sense of Judaism. It’s a really great criticism by people who are extremely qualified to make those criticisms (both are rabbi’s and I think they both have doctorates in theology, specifically Modern Orthodox Judaism, which makes for a really cool viewpoint). I can’t find anything about the third author of this book, who is a woman, but it’s comforting to know that a woman had a part in this as well. Obviously these people love Judaism, they just want to see it adapt to modernity. Just in general it’s a really thoughtful book that challenges dogma. 

Jewish Literacy was recommended by an anon (thank you!) The rest of the title is “The Most Important Things to Know about The Jewish Religion, Its People and Its History” so like. Ya get what ya see here folks. HOWEVER I did see a review that mentions there is some Islamophobia and hostility towards Jews who are antizionist. It does genuinely look informative and I haven’t read it myself so I can’t attune to whether or not that review is accurate, but maybe be cautious if you read this in knowing that the author may not be objective. 

Book of Mercy made me openly weep and feel something tender and weird in my heart and like. Okay so it’s not informative so much as it’s a book of poetry by Leonard Cohen (he was Jewish if you didn’t know!) He calls his poems “modern psalms” and honestly this would be a good read even if you aren’t religious at all because his writing is just so gorgeous. But it does have references to Judaism and his identity as a Jew 

Understanding Judaism is really a “building blocks” kind of book to me, if that makes sense? It’s really informative but also really basic and is fantastic for people who know very little about Judaism or just want a well presented understanding of the core aspects of the Jewish religion. Even if you aren’t a Jew who’s looking to learn or someone who is considering conversion it’s still a good book if you’re interested in world religions regardless of your faith or lack thereof. (man I’m starting to sound pretentious lmao I just mean like, if you’re an atheist or Catholic or whatever, it’s pretty interesting and also this guy is kinda dorky-funny so it makes for an easier read than some other books about religion)

Shmooze I think this is meant to be more for a group to read an discuss, and like, also maybe meant for a younger audience (I’m talking about teenagers so not really that young, but if you’ve been reading dull infodumps by 90 y/o Jewish rabbis with doctorate degrees this is gonna be a change of pace lmao) I should mention that I’ve only read like two pages of this book because I saw it at Barnes and Noble and just kinda briefly checked it out so I don’t know a ton about it but it stuck in my head and the reviews look positive so 

Obvious I don’t think you have to read all of those because I haven’t even read all of those so maybe just check one of them out if it seems like it could be helpful to you. 

Judaism here on tumblr dot com:

Okay so like. This is really my personal diced onion so take it however you will but keep in mind that this really only reflects things I’ve come across and how I feel. 

Obviously there are a lot of really great blogs about Judaism but I don’t have any specific ones to recommend I’m sorry :O I really really hate ~Discourse~ and like, in-depth arguments about the Holocaust because I get so wrapped up in it and let’s be honest, tumblr is all about the discourse and ignorance. That being said, I like to follow other people who are Jewish and blog about whatever because that usually leads to safer discussions and also is a great way to find really helpful thoughts and discussions by other Jews about topics like being LGBT, being a woman, being an atheist, etc. These are just nice to read and also if you aren’t familiar with certain Yiddish or Hebrew terms that are commonly used it’s a good way to see how and when they’re used in certain contexts. 

I’m going to tag anything like this that I post here as “good info” just so me and anyone who wants can find this stuff easier. No they won’t necessarily have anything to do with hockey. 

Also please be very careful when you’re reading a post that is presenting certain things as facts, always double check what someone is saying because misinformation is spread so quickly, and it’s almost always unintentional. The things that I find genuinely helpful/safe/fun involve opinions, common feelings and experiences, little personal stories and jokes, cool stuff like that. 

I’m Jewish on my father’s side :0

Me too boo. Unfortunately that’s an unending discussion, and one that is often held by matrilineal Jews and doesn’t actually include patrilineal Jews, nor does it consider our thoughts/feelings/experiences. Without sounding like an idiot, it is absolutely buckwild to me that there are people who have been raised Jewish, have never known anything other than Jewish tradition, have been subject to antisemitism, but still aren’t considered Jewish. 

And then this is where I see matrilineal Jews who hold this viewpoint bring up Reform Judaism, which is one of the three main branches of Judaism and does recognize patrilineall Jews as Jews. I’ve seen some discrepancy as to whether or not patrilineal Jews had to have been raised Jewish in order to be considered Jewish. This is all well and good for Jews like me whose family practices Reform Judaism, but for patrilineal Jews who wish to practice in an Orthodox or Conservative synagogue, it gets tricky. 

Basically, yes this is a huge topic that inspires a lot of disagreement, and that sucks, but here’s what it comes down to. No one else is allowed to make you feel inferior because of your heritage. So many people, even modern Orthodox Jews, recognize that certain aspects of Judaism need to adapt to today’s society. I don’t want to offend anyone here, but I really do feel that most matrilineal Jews who don’t consider us Jewish are extremely hypocritical (for a lot of reasons but mostly like...y’all really follow every aspect of Jewish Law? Like do you really? All of it? Girl do u? Or are you maybe just being elitist). Learning about your heritage, talking about shared experiences, combating antisemitism, these are all things that are fair game for you (especially for the anon who said they were atheist) and going to Shabbat services, praying, participating in holy days. That’s all yours if you want it, bubbeleh. 

Can I be an atheist Jew?

Sure you can! I, personally, am not an atheist so I wasn’t comfortable finding specific resources about this because I don’t really know much about it? It’s fine with me if you’re atheist that’s none of my business, I just don’t want to direct you to a bad source. But yes, many Jews are atheist, many are secular, I’m sure there are many here on tumblr. It’s absolutely okay, Judaism is an ethnoreligion, and while you may experience Judaism different than the rest of us, you’re still a Jew and still belong. 

Here’s an excerpt from a short lil synopsis of Judaism:

These three connotations of Judaism as a monotheistic system, as a literary tradition, and as a historical culture are sometimes viewed separately. For example, there are Jews who see themselves as culturally Jewish, but who are also non-religious or atheist, often identifying more strongly with Jewish “peoplehood” than with traditional understandings of God and Torah. Even so, all Jews would recognize that these three points of reference have shaped and guided Jewish experience through the ages.

Jewish “peoplehood” that they talk about is like. Culture, customs, food, art, history, etc. 

One last little note on this, you’ll hear a lot that Judaism focuses more on actions than on beliefs. This is an excellent article that is pretty short and worth reading that I want to include because I think that even if you don’t believe in G-d or even if you are seriously questioning, the focus on just. Doing good. Actively doing good things and trying to be a good person (I know that’s objective but bear with me) is a such a huge part of Judaism that you can try to incorporate into your life without having to subscribe to any sort of dogma or beliefs that you don’t hold. “Judaism is certainly a faith-based tradition. Belief in G-d is central to our religion. It just isn’t a prerequisite. If you are Jewish, you are so regardless of belief.” 

But I’m a feminist....

As you should be. This is probably another personal statement you gon’ wanna take with a grain of salt, but I think Judaism, especially in the last 50 years or so, has made huge strides in this. Especially Reform Judaism, but that kind of goes without saying. 

Example, my synagogue was founded as a Conservative synagogue. Our website still says we are. I’m not actually sure tbqh, like I said, my family are Reform Jews, and so are most other families in our congregation I think but this is literally the only synagoge for like hundreds of miles so. Anyways our rabbi is female (Rabbi Shaina!) and she does great work, we all love her. She’s really adament on teaching kids that gender shouldn’t keep you from anything, that Judaism is for all Jews, that it should enhance our lives. She wears a tallis, lays her tefillin, and reads from the Torah. 

My point here is that while this isn’t like, the end of misogyny in Judaism as we know it, it’s still a big deal in most religions to have a woman as their religious leader, essentially a position of religious power. For men to accept a woman as a religious leader is not something that is super common in most religions. And we’re like, a tiny congregation over a hundred miles away from anyone else, technically a Conservative synagogue, that’s super loving and accepting of a feminist running our shit... female rabbis are super common and I think it speaks a lot to how we’re progressing as a religion. Reform Judaism is going to be your best bet when it comes to tolerance but knowing that all three of the main branches are progressing, at least with this, is really comforting to me. 

However, that’s an extremely one sided view and doesn’t really show the issue as a whole. This super short article (? not sure) is a bit pessimistic in my mind but presents the other side of things and gives a good explanation of the traditional sources of misogyny in Judaism, so this could further your understanding as well. 

By no means are we perfect but we’re workin on it. Look into Jewish Feminism though, if you have the time. That article is just a lil intro to the topic. 

I’m Q*eer/LGBT and I’m not sure y’all are gonna be cool with that...

Well this one’s a doozy. 

I’ll kick this right off by presenting an article that is objective and does not reflect the author’s opinion, just lays out the issues at hand. It also has some links to other good pieces, including one cool story about a transgender man, Rafi Daugherty, embracing his role as a father and details his experience with pregnancy and giving birth. I should mention that I am cisgender so I’m interpreting this article through a different point of view, but it really does make a point of celebrating Rafi and his daughter and sharing their story. It does include a little cultural background context, but this is a positive story that I think deserves to be shared :) 

Then there’s this statement from the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism that confirms its absolute acceptance and support of LGBT Jews. 

On the other side of things, there are still homophobic and intolerant Jews. Conversion camps were not just a Christian thing, there were Jewish conversion camps as well, which is horrific. Idk what to say because I think homophobia and transphobia in Judaism is really similar to what you would find in Christian settings. 

I’m bisexual and I feel completely welcomed by other Jews who know this about me, and I certainly don’t feel any less Jewish because of it. 

I live in a place where Jewish spaces are rare.

I really hate to disappoint with this one but I don’t have any specific sources or anything like that. Alls I got to say is that’s why the internet is so great? I really don’t feel like that’s helpful at all, but I think for the most part, the Jewish side of tumblr is pretty accepting and welcoming. Obviously that’s not always gonna be true though idkdjaskfl;dj

I spose with this one I wanna encourage anyone who has any good resources for involvement or something like that to reply to this post or drop by my inbox and let me know! Or maybe just your thoughts on some Jewish spaces you’ve encountered? 

I hope this was helpful

In conclusion, don’t let anyone make you feel less Jewish. Your sexual identity, gender identity, and even your belief in G-d doesn’t take away from your Jewishness. I’d like to say that since I started delving into Judaism a little more I’ve found a lot of peace. And yeah that sounds cliche and also vague but it’s really a breath of fresh air to learn about my family and know more about this community. Also if you’re comfortable with or willing to try prayer, even if you’re atheist, it can be a good way to decompress sometimes, a really therapeutic kind of way to voice your thoughts and feelings and reflect on them. 

There’s so much information and culture to delve into but it’s so so worth it to learn and I’m really happy for you that you’re interested in getting more in touch with your Jewish roots. 

If any of these links don’t work and you’d like to see them let me know!

#this took 78 years sorry #ok for anyone to rb #there are TYPOS galore I'm sorry #judaism

[neptunecreek]

Speaking Freely: An Interview With Biella Coleman

Around the globe, freedom of expression (or free speech) varies wildly in definition, scope, and level of access. The impact of the digital age on perceptions and censorship of speech has been felt across the political spectrum on a worldwide scale. In the debate over what counts as free expression and how it should work in practice, we often lose sight of how different forms of censorship—of hate speech, for example—can have a negative impact on different communities, and especially marginalized or vulnerable ones.

Speaking Freely brings forth interviews with human rights workers, free expression advocates, and activists from a variety of disciplines and affiliations. The common thread in these interviews is that curtailing free expression, via public or private censorship, can harm our ability to fully and authentically participate in an open society.

Gabriella “Biella” Coleman is an anthropologist whose work focuses on a range of subjects, from the anthropology of medicine to the practice of whistleblowing. To EFF readers, she is probably best known for her work on hacker communities. In 2014, she published the book Hacker, Hoaxer, Whistleblower, Spy: The Many Faces of Anonymous (Verso). She currently holds the Wolfe Chair in Scientific & Technological Literacy at McGill University in Montréal. 

I first met Biella at Berlin’s re:publica conference in 2011, and got to know her when we both contributed chapters to Beyond Wikileaks: Implications for the Future of Communications, Journalism, and Society. She’s a long-time friend to many EFFers, and contributed to our 2018 collaboration with McSweeney’s, The End of Trust. 

We recently got together to discuss a subject that Biella—who has a background in medical anthropology—has been thinking about for a long time: How medical misinformation spreads, and how attempts to curb that spread can potentially cause harm to patient communities, particularly those that lack trust in the medical system for valid reasons. Mis- or disinformation has been a hot topic since the 2016 U.S. election, and its impact on vaccination rates is an important issue, but rarely is the other side of the coin—that is, the harm that censorship can cause to patients seeking answers to little-understood medical concerns—discussed in policy circles.

It's a subject we spend a lot of time thinking about at EFF. We know that misinformation can lead to harm, but we're also wary of attempts to censor it—particularly when censorship is proposed as the only solution to what is nearly always a much deeper societal issue. Some of us have found great value in online patient communities, and understand that freedom of expression is integral to such spaces. We think that Biella's insights into the topic will be valuable to anyone who struggles with this question.

York: So what are we talking about today?

I’ve been thinking a lot of free speech issues in the context of medical misinformation. And then I’ve also been thinking about how certain quarters of the left are very dissatisfied with free speech. This is an ongoing problem, but it’s become very punctuated. I think it’s shortsighted, even though many of the critiques are valid...I think it’s very dangerous to let go of free speech commitments. I actually think it’s incumbent on people [like us] to help explain why it’s important why free speech also can’t solve a lot of problems. It’s something I often think about in terms of putting [free speech] in its place, but not getting rid of it.

York: Let’s start with medical misinformation then. It’s something I’m very concerned about as well. There are some interesting problems here, and no easy solutions—I’d love to get your take on that.

Indeed, there is a lot of medical misinformation out there. But as a scholar who often looks at the history of science and medicine, oftentimes the state of medicine is such where we can be quite sure about a cluster of issues but there’s a cluster of other issues that are in a dramatic state of uncertainty, and they always coexist at once. It makes everything from doctoring to policing information very difficult.

The famous example is of course vaccinations. There’s a lot of fear and misinformation and it is important to get the scientific consensus out there. But sometimes today scientific consensus is upended by the scientific field as well. Patients have fought very hard in order to gain a voice in order to help that process along in very important ways, whether it was psychiatric patients fighting against electric shock therapy or HIV activists demanding a different method for clinical trials. They were pushing against the grain of medical consensus at the time. So I always fear a set of commitments and solutions that rest on the idea of full certainty in one moment.

This is one of the reasons why it’s such a conundrum—because today’s scientific consensus may be tomorrow’s consensus, but some of it may not be, and where and how you draw that line may be difficult. I think it’s important to recognize that as we move forward with solutions. For example, I think something like linking to the CDC website to provide information about vaccinations is a really good idea, while I’m actually kind of against blanket bans.

This is for two reasons: There’s a lot of value in patients getting together to push against the medical establishment, because they can be wrong, so you just have to modulate that in way where you can point people to what the medical field believes is the correct information, but what happens with blanket bans is they impinge too much on the ability for patients to get together and discuss freely in ways that sometimes do go against the medical establishment. And then more importantly, it creates extreme resentment and more mistrust of mainstream scientific establishments. And so when you’re trying to correct for misinformation, it works against your very goal.

York: I agree, that’s so important. What you said about the idea of censorship creating resentment is interesting...it’s not the Streisand effect exactly, but it’s definitely something of concern to me as well, that when we suppress certain speech, it gets pushed into dark spaces. Can you elaborate on that?

Sure. And let me be clear: I’m not saying there are no instances of speech on various platforms that shouldn’t be banned. It’s also because I believe that different providers have the right to configure their communities in certain ways. What I’m really concerned about here is the medical realm.

I do think that if we start seeing a trend where medical information, even the sort that we deem extremely problematic, is across the board or mostly banned—first of all, it’s not going to prevent people from gathering, there are just too many channels through which people will find other  places to congregate—it’ll fuel their conviction that they’re absolutely right to the extent that trying to change their mind becomes even harder than it is today. And, in some cases, it can push some of these groups and communities to places that are more difficult to track and see, but where they’re still associating and sharing information. 

And again, I think that the risk in banning medical information too is you will catch in the net certain forms of pushback, discussions, that may strike as misinformation today, but in another ten years they’re not. So, where do you draw that line? Maybe sometimes you do draw that line, but very, very conservatively. You say, ‘you know what? There are fifteen things we find questionable, but we’ll only ban two of them, because scientific consensus is of extreme agreement, whereas in the other thirteen there are not.’ 

Many gains have been made by patient communities and lay experts getting together to push against dominant models of the time, and that’s everything from the minimization of side effects from drugs to questioning dominant therapies ... Medical history has shown that a lot of positive good comes when patients come together to be able to talk and share information that is not the consensus of the time.

York: You may recall a few years ago, when I posted on Facebook about trying to find a diagnosis, and connecting with online communities really helped. I can’t even tell you how many people I know who have been helped by online medical communities, especially those with chronic illnesses.

And that’s the thing...so many people with chronic illnesses especially, or obscure ones, or ones that are controversial like autoimmune diseases...these patient communities are vital for people to get to a diagnosis and be able to move forward with therapy. 

If you’re on these forums, there’s a total mix of misinformation and scientific consensus, and also a range of information where you can’t even really say what it is because the state of the science is also uncertain.

And so I do fear blanket censorship, extreme bans, even while I favor some interventions that can maybe flag certain types of medical misinformation. I don’t know how effective that will be; it’s an open question that can be researched, but I’d be in favor of those types of interventions over more blunt instruments.

York: Yeah, I can understand that position.

Yeah, with hate speech and Nazi stuff, it’s maybe a different story. I feel less well-positioned to talk about it.

York: We don’t have to, that’s up to you.

[Coleman laughs]. I’m trained as a medical anthropologist so I know the history of … historical change around scientific consensus and facts and how wildly it can swing at times, and the role of patients and the importance of having an independent sphere of autonomy to discuss these issues, you know? I’m less familiar with the hate speech stuff even though I kind of obsess about it a little bit.

York: None of us want to touch it, right? It’s not simple. I’ve been dealing with it quite a bit, but we don’t have to do that here. Instead, let’s move to something else that interests you. I’d love to hear your thoughts on something else, which we’re grappling with too: How do we talk to the left about free speech?

Whew. Yeah, it’s so good that we’re talking about this. My general commitment is that we lose a lot if we cede free speech commitments and discourse, which are not the same thing, to the right. And in order for us not to allow that relinquishment to happen, we do have to make a more convincing case as to why free speech still matters for progressive and leftist causes.

Obviously, what we’ve done is not working, so we have to rethink both our commitments and our packaging. 

York: Yes. This is so important.

Okay, so first: What do we lose if we relinquish both our visible commitments—if it’s not part of our platform anymore—and also, if we don’t fight for it? It’s two different things. One has to do, oddly enough, with recruitment.

I think that there’s sometimes this idea among progressive and leftists that those who go to certain channels of the right 

What I’ve observed is that some progressives, especially young ones who are pro-immigration and have left politics on one level are drawn to people like [members of the so-called “intellectual dark web”], and they’re extremely skeptical of progressives and leftists on free speech grounds. They see those types as being critical thinkers, not the left. And so, if we cede free speech as a commitment and discourse, we will lose people that could be joining our cause to the right. It’s like a counter-radicalization strategy.

There are people who are like ‘Aren’t we supposed to like free speech? Haven’t we fought for this? Isn’t that what the university, and journalism, are about?’

So if the left is saying that free speech has been overvalued and doesn’t help our cause, of course young people are going to be like ‘that’s weird,’ you know what I mean? It’s such an important cultural value that just to denigrate it off the bat, for people who don’t know the complexities of many issues, it becomes a deterrent. That’s one reason that if we cede it to the right, we will also be pushing groups of people who have progressive leanings to the least reactionary, but nevertheless reactionary parts of the right. I see it all the time.

York: Yes, yes. I mean, we saw that article about Emma Sulcowicz just this week.

Yes! I know, exactly! But then, on top of that, is two things, one of which is that certainly free speech if we have it and institute it, whether at the university or through journalistic channels or more widely—it’s not a panacea. The history of liberal thought has had a simplistic idea: Ensure that people have access to free speech, get good information out there, and good ideas will prevail. There are a lot of naive assumptions built into the philosophical base about free speech. And I think that for those of us that want to continue to have a place and reclaim it, we have to put the naive assumptions aside and say, ‘okay, it’s not a panacea.’

But imagine if we had no free speech, what would happen. Well, for example historically, leftists often get thrown under the bus. Their free speech rights, for example in universities, are often the first to go. There was an interesting Washington Post op-ed about this; it was about how the speakers being disinvited or de-platformed are often leftists, around issues like Palestine and BDS, are often muted, and if we had robust free speech protections, it would be harder to do that.

Historically, whether it was McCarthyism on or off campuses in the United States, or BDS today, without protections, leftist and progressive causes will be silenced. That’s one reason to keep them at play, or fight for them. 

Another thing too is that people on the right do embrace free speech rhetoric in extremely problematic ways, like ‘oh, forcing me to use your preferred pronoun impinges on my free speech rights,’ like Jordan Peterson’s case. I think that a case can be made as to why it doesn’t impinge someone’s speech rights, but [that’s not what I focus on]. When I teach about civil liberties and free speech, those just aren’t the issues I emphasize. I emphasize things like whistleblowing, or how difficult it was for newspapers to be able to publish stolen material that was in the public interest. Things that then led to significant social change, such as the Pentagon Papers. I try to show why free speech still really matters for the running of the free press so that it’s clear that if we lost those protections, we’d be in a much more precarious place.

We have to both recognize what free speech has gained us, what we will lose if we totally relinquish these protections, and also recognize that there are other structural dynamics that have nothing to do with free speech that shape who can speak. Even with good free speech protections, a lot of other elements need to be instituted for progressive change. 

Free speech is a helpful ingredient in the cocktail of progressive politics, but shouldn’t be the only ingredient in our cocktail.

York: Yeah, I agree. 

I think that always, as we fight for it, we have to put it in its place, and recognize its power and its limits at the same time. So that’s what I try to do when I support it and talk about it.

York: This is awesome, I love this. I’m in so much violent agreement with what you’re saying. I’ve been really leaning over the past few years toward highlighting the ways in which marginalized communities are affected by speech regulations. And I think it’s really interesting that there’s a recognition of that amongst the left, but a lot of the solutions proposed [to things like hate speech] don’t recognize how collateral damage might happen.

Exactly. That’s the interesting thing, both for free speech and anonymity: There is collateral damage! When you protect these things, there are going to be some problems that preciptate out of that, but then an extreme narrowing of free speech or anonymity will also produce collateral damage for our own politics as well. So, we need to make that case, we need to make that obvious, both by going back into history—looking at how those who are persecuted have been progressives and leftists—and show how that’s also the present when it comes to campus politics as well. The BDS example is one of the best ones. I’ve seen it in Berkeley and on my own campus, where BDS makes a strong showing, and then there’s an idea where we have to curb its expression. It’s put in the fold of hate speech, but it’s not—it’s attacking a political configuration, and people should have the free speech right to canvass this cause on campus.

Also, just to reiterate the very first point I made, there’s a great point made, I think, by Corey Robin. He made this case where we have to embrace discourses of freedom because American society is still obsessed with this question. So yes, we still have to have a progressive politics, a platform, but you can still thread that through commitments to freedom, because that’s just kind of the milieu in which this country was founded and configured. 

I think it’s the same with free speech; it’s a very familiar discourse that was aligned with progressive causes for a long time. It doesn’t only serve progressive causes, but it’s progressives that fought for the right to have more robust free speech protections. 

...So, if all of a sudden we relinquish that only to the right, we will fail to convince some younger people to join more progressive causes as well.

York: Absolutely. Okay, here’s a question I’ve been asking everybody: Do you have a free speech hero?

Ha, that’s a good question. I will say the whistleblower. The whistleblower to me is so important, whether it is the whistleblower in a corporation such as those who exposed Theranos in Silicon Valley, or whether it’s [Daniel] Ellsberg, or Snowden, or anonymous whistleblowers...it’s so risky to get that information out, and you risk so much in doing so.

We do need massive free speech protections, and beyond, to both ensure that they’re not punished and that those that publish information like newspapers are also protected. There have been many gains garnered from whistleblowing and, in fact, we need more of it and more effective whistleblowing as well. And for me, the figure of the whistleblower is my free speech hero, as well as the journalist willing to publish information provided by the whistleblower. That’s incredibly important.

And they should be our hero, not the Jordan Peterson who just doesn’t want to use “she/he”. That’s just kind of justifying being an asshole. I think it’s important to engage in the debate about why that’s problematic, but you don’t see people like that embracing the whistleblower, do you? I find that interesting. So yes, progressives should embrace free speech, but a different facet of it. We need to explain why those protections gain us something.

Of course it isn’t always effective, but whether it’s the ending of the Tuskegee experiments—that was done by a whistleblower—or the Pentagon Papers, or the closing of Theranos, there have just been so many gains, even though whistleblowing doesn’t always result in the change we want to see. We’d be much worse off if it didn’t exist, or if it were harder to do than it already is.

York: I want to touch on something you said here. You know, the thing that really frustrates me about some of the free speech defenders on the right is that I don’t see them speaking up about government censorship of sexuality, obscenity, et cetera. How are they okay with that?

Well, it’s a very selective reading of free speech. 

But [there’s another thing I want to address]. When we look at [some of the criticisms of the left], they’re focused on things like the insistence of using certain words. But we can change that narrative. If I were to address it, I would note that we, as a society, change our terms all the time for the purposes of civil rights: We don’t use the N-word, we don’t use “colored,” “homosexual” is out of favor. And it’s because these people have been discriminated against, and fought hard for their civil rights. And so changing language is part of that architecture of civil rights and respect.

We change our language to conform to protocols of respect and dignity and civil rights. Free speech issues have to do with governments and corporations squelching the little Davids who are fighting the Goliaths. There are ways to approach the language issues where we can still fight for free speech protections.

York: Yeah, I hear this a lot from people, and it’s not a policy issue or a free speech issue. It’s something for us to have conversations about.

Yes, and to come up with what’s going to have the most respect for the autonomy and dignity of these groups.

We have to think about how we present it, and again, I do see this thing where [people on the left] say ‘free speech is useless, the right is using it to make these ridiculous arguments.’ It’s tough—there are many different sets of issues that get wrapped up into one ball.

York: Yes, absolutely. We’ve touched on so many important things here. Thank you, Biella!

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Media Literacy and its effect on youth

Introduction 

Every day the world as we know it becomes more digitized and social-media-centric. Information can be accessed with one tap or click and is constantly filtered throughout our days’ timelines. While the internet proves to be an unprecedented resource for those reasons, it is also a cesspool for misinformation. With content streaming non stop, false information spreads like wildfire and is often shared without hesitation. Much of that sharing phenomenon is done so with good intentions, but too often is it the case that people simply cannot recognize whether the information they are viewing and sharing is false, misinformed, fabricated, or exaggerated. This begs the question of how to teach people media literacy or, in other words, to understand, identify, analyze, and avoid misinformation. Perhaps one solution lies within public high schools and, more specifically, English classes.

Defining the problem/background

Media literacy is more important now than it has ever been before. Today, technology allows for anyone to generate information that the masses view. This doesn’t seem like a problem until false information is taken as hard facts. Instances of false information come in the form of online tabloids that simply want to generate views and don’t care about the validity of the statements made. Other forms of “fake news” are also found in mainstream media. Evidence of this comes from the shocking results of the presidential campaign despite all the news feeds hailing Hillary Clinton the victor  before the election ended. Fake news is a pervasive entity in our current society because of a lack of knowledge in media literacy as a whole and overall misunderstanding of how to critically analyze information. Media literacy is also key in the evolving career opportunity that is growing as fast as technology. Without proper knowledge of different media, opportunity for selection in certain fields won’t be available. By educating the youth in technology that will be utilized, it allows for a capable individual to handle different tasks that may confront them in the future.

Recommendation 

As essential as media literacy is to everyone today, only two states currently have media literacy requirements in place for high schools, though some integrate the teachings at their own discretion. According to an organization called Media Literacy Now, Florida and Ohio have officially implemented requirements for their students to demonstrate proficient skills in media literacy. Both states grant their school districts freedom on how to do this, which means that they are free to integrate the skills into existing courses. This allows schools and educators to decide how and where these lessons would fit in best for their student body. Following this style, we are proposing that Michigan high schools should integrate teachings in media literacy to existing English courses. English courses are required for all students to graduate and encompass many of the ideas that we would like to incorporate in teaching media literacy. According to Armada High School English teacher Michael Becker, “on a daily class level, it’s pretty easy to shift and amend as long as it fits in some way to the already established curriculum. If I wanted to shift all of the curriculum or add a new class, it’s a pretty lengthy bureaucracy. Lots of proposals, paperwork, meetings, etc.” Though we are choosing to implement the curriculum into existing English courses, freedom will be granted to each educator in how they choose to deliver the information.

Rather than providing a strict curriculum that cost large sums of money and time, we will provide a list of skills in which students will have to demonstrate proficiency. National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) proposed the following list of skills in which we anticipate this program resulting: basic knowledge of how to utilize technology, ability to create and share media on a global level, ethical analysis of media, and management and analysis of many modes of media at once.

To analyze the resulting proficiency, we propose that skills be evaluated in existing SAT testing. Two existing sections of the test could integrate the listed skills: reading as well as writing and language. According to The Princeton Review, the reading section is currently a 65 minute section comprised of 52 multiple choice questions regarding literature, natural and social science, historical documentation and more. The writing and language section is a 35 minute section made up of 44 multiple choice questions focusing on topics such as grammar, vocabulary, writing analysis and more. Both sections of the exam have aspects of our desired skills and we feel that integrating some media literacy content would not drastically alter the test but simply enhance its already established goals.

To provide teachers with the necessary tools to teach their students, we propose to integrate the skills into professional development days that are already taking place. Much of the content already provided to English educators could be used in the context of media literacy. For example, when learning about the ethical analysis of media, this could be integrated in ethical analysis of existing literature already present in the curriculum. We anticipate that this integration of media literacy and existing English content would not add large amounts of time to the professional development days. These days of professional development are already incorporated in the education budget, and would not require any additional funding. For the content that will be added to the professional development days, there are many free online resources specifically made for educating of teachers. As previously mentioned, Media Literacy Now is one of these resources. Their free presentations span a wide variety of topics within the realm of media literacy. Some of these include basics of copywriting, analysis of propaganda, using a smartphone, digital authorship, understanding cultural differences through media, and more. This is not the only free source of these lesson plans, making this plan essentially free and easily accessible.

However, there are positives and negatives to every policy, and this one is no different. The biggest positive aspect of this proposal is the fact that the lessons students will receive accurately mirror everyday life. Technology is essentially integrated into every facet of life: work, school, fitness, shopping, social interaction, etc. Being media literate will allow for success in all of these areas as well as enhance critical thinking skills. Our proposal will also close the gap in education levels between school districts. The establishment of standard skill levels across every school district will allow for every student to receive the same, necessary education. On the other hand, integrating media literacy in standardized curriculum does not come without its challenges such as preparing educators for the changes. Since staff are able to choose how to add the content to their courses, they will have to make changes to their current lesson plans. Lesson plan development is already a duty of the job and is therefore funded, but this could potentially be a difficult task. This also poses problems for professional development days. Media literacy content needs to be integrated into these existing days. The integration requires time and effort, which is a potential flaw in the proposal. Another potential problem is the attainment of technology for the classroom. It can not be assumed that every classroom in Michigan has equal amounts of technological tools. Although each teacher will have the ability to convey the lessons in ways they choose, technological tools are an essential part of this. Some school districts may not have the tools to teach as the educators see fit. Regardless of these potential problems, we believe that the proposal laid out is the best and most cost effective and efficient way to educate high school students on media literacy.

Proposal Alternatives 

Some districts may find it difficult to add material to already established professional development days. An alternative to doing so includes some type of online training or classes for teachers to take when it is most convenient for them. This offers even more leniency and flexibility to the incorporation of media literacy into curricula in that teachers have discretion even in learning how to teach it. However, by removing media literacy from the professional development days, districts must find ways to make teachers accountable for completing those online courses. Possible solutions include paying them time-and-a-half upon completion, offering incentives that remain within budget boundaries, or simply paying hourly wages for the time it takes to complete courses. The average annual salary of public school teachers, according to the Detroit Free Press, was $61,560 as of 2012. It is up to individual districts to decide how they will ensure that their teachers take those online trainings should they chose that alternative.

Ethical Analysis 

In analyzing the ethical ramifications of this decision, we must look at this under two possibilities: if it were to continue being a neglected subject and if media literacy were to become required.

Looking at this issue under the first terms, we are looking at the question of what effect this could have. The people who would gain the most from this are the people who cannot afford community college or university classes and are thus deprived of critical media consumption skills. So these people are more easily persuaded by media sources and, in some cases, could more easily be dissuaded from political involvement and establishing an unbiased world-view. This could have detrimental effects on their ability to navigate the world of jobs and cultural progress through limiting the skills that they could gain by understanding the wealth of information available for free over the internet. Also because no one would need to appeal to this audience except as a source of viewers for advertisers, their voice is lost in public discourse.

Looking at the possibility of providing this service to students, we run into various obstacles. For one, standardized testing has proved a hindering factor in teaching students necessary information. Because standardized testing is focused on testing the natural ability that is assumed to be translatable in areas of college study, students aren’t tested on the necessary information. This must be considered because teachers, not students, have the largest incentive for excelling. Teacher’s salaries and promotions improve based on average test scores, so “teaching from the test” is, at times, the most common practice. If Michigan is to establish a media literacy curriculum, one of the most important factors should be either further research on how this area of study could be translated to improving SAT scores, or toward lobbying national testing corporations to include areas of study like this on their tests.

And while this could provide better opportunities for low-income students, this would increase the stress felt by teachers. Thus what should be considered is using this as a replacement rather than as an addition to a certain weak point in Michigan curriculum.

Conclusion 

In conclusion, media literacy is essential to a student’s success in any career path and should be a required set of skills taught early on in their education, preferably in high school. Learning to understand, identify, and analyze media and their content will equip students with crucial critical thinking skills which they can implement and execute in all situations. The values and goals present in high school English classes, which are required for students to graduate, resonate with those of desired media literacy courses, so there is perhaps no better alternative subject in which to implement them. We have proposed that media literacy material and how to deliver it be introduced to teachers during already established professional development days so as not to dent budgets too greatly. Flexible media literacy curricula can also be easily accessed online and thus implemented into existing curricula at the discretion of teachers. With the digital age becoming increasingly saturated and inclusive, it is thus crucial that students be taught how to navigate through it, regardless of how school districts choose to do so.

Annotated Bibliography

Tanner , Kristi. Database: How much do Michigan teachers get paid. Detroit Free Press, 2014

This source was chosen because it provided statistics that are pertinent our policy. Knowing how much annual salary that teachers are paid in Michigan can allow our financial plan work well with money already allocated for education and supplies. This article also provided trends in the salary and what possible changes could be made in the future.  The  trends of the market have fluctuated and with these statistics one can measure a safe budget.

Wyman-Blackburn, Steven. Getting Literal about media Literacy in K12

This article provided great information about fake news and the use of fake news in the media weather it was intentional or not. This article provided efforts that have been made to approach media literacy in schools. The article provided an explanation about how certain districts combat just listening to what media tells you and making a sound educated decision through researching facts using media as a tool. This document can give great cues to combat illiteracy in media and give students the ability to make critical thinking second nature.

Media Literacy Now, Inc. 2015

This source was used because we needed to find various ways to incorporate media literacy. Media Literacy now offers a multitude of  options to teach. The organization provides links to different types of media such as radio and writing. Consortium’s  and libraries are also available. WIth these resources we were able to gather sound and effect tools that would make great accommodations to teach students.

Olshan, Jeremy. “Rich kids use the Internet to get ahead, and poor kids use it mindlessly.” 2015

Simply put, this article hits in the direction on why we believe media literacy is key in schools. By looking at resources provided for children and access to internet shows how younger individuals use media. The article speaks on the unfair advantage that wealth provides and when the opportunity to use the same resources arise such as smartphones and computers, they are used differently. Not only does this article provide truth to our statements but it also allows us to focus what should be the main goal is being successful in our policy.

TPR Education Holdings, LLC. 2017

In order to make good decisions on how testing should go, this source was use to figure out how testing works. This web source provided clear changes in testing and also showed the the value and way the tests are structured. By analyzing this data we can construct a way to make our recommendation and add new standards to testing without being redundant and ill effective. Also by looking at  this blueprint, we also brainstormed on new ways that testing could be administered besides just pencil and paper.

38 percent of 2014 high school graduates enrolled in college were in labor force in October 2014 : The Economics Daily. (2015, April 20). Retrieved April 17, 2017

Bureau of Labor Statistics Article “38 percent of 2014 high school graduates enrolled in college were in labor force October 2014.” This article showed the proportion of high school graduates that were not enrolled in college at 72.7. This datum was important in understanding the size of high school graduates that would be unable to gain media literacy knowledge through college instruction and thus would never be able to gain this knowledge through instruction.

Jerold, Craig. “Teach to the Test? Just say no.” 2006.

This article describes the rampancy of “teaching to the test” or specifically instructing students on how to take a standardized test rather than teaching necessary skills. Since this is such a common practice, it was thought that making attempts to change the skills on the test to better fit necessary life skills would help cement the information for students.

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